A_Wrinkle_in_Time

tonight is the least grown-out-of-it group
that could be gathered together in one
place, simply by the nature of our work.
We, too, can understand how Alice could
walk through the mirror into the country
on the other side; how often have our
children almost done this themselves?
And we all understand princesses, of
course. Haven’t we all been badly bruised
by peas? And what about the princess
who spat forth toads and snakes
whenever she opened her mouth to speak,
and the other whose lips issued forth
pieces of pure gold? We all have had days
when everything we’ve said has seemed
to turn to toads. The days of gold, alas,
don’t come nearly as often.

What a child doesn’t realize until he is
grown is that in responding to fantasy,

fairy tale, and myth he is responding to
what Erich Fromm calls the one universal
language, the one and only language in
the world that cuts across all barriers of
time, place, race, and culture. Many
Newbery books are from this realm,
beginning with Dr. Dolittle; books on
Hindu myth, Chinese folklore, the life of
Buddha, tales of American Indians, books
that lead our children beyond all
boundaries and into the one language of
all mankind.

In the beginning God created the
heaven and the earth … The
extraordinary, the marvelous thing about
Genesis is not how unscientific it is, but
how amazingly accurate it is. How could
the ancient Israelites have known the
exact order of an evolution that wasn’t to

be formulated for thousands of years?
Here is a truth that cuts across barriers of
time and space.

But almost all of the best children’s
books do this, not only an Alice in
Wonderland, a Wind in the Willows, a
Princess and the Goblin. Even the most
straightforward tales say far more than
they seem to mean on the surface. Little
Women, The Secret Garden, Huckleberry
Finn—how much more there is in them
than we realize at a first reading. They
partake of the universal language, and
this is why we turn to them again and
again when we are children, and still
again when we have grown up.

Up on the summit of Mohawk
Mountain in northwest Connecticut is a
large flat rock that holds the heat of the

sun long after the last of the late sunset
has left the sky. We take our picnic up
there and then lie on the rock and watch
the stars, one pulsing slowly into the
deepening blue, and then another and
another and another, until the sky is full
of them.

A book, too, can be a star, “explosive
material, capable of stirring up fresh life
endlessly,” a living fire to lighten the
darkness, leading out into the expanding
universe.

A WRINKLE IN TIME. Text copyright
© 1962 by Crosswicks, Ltd.

Introduction copyright © 2012 by
Katherine Paterson.

Afterword copyright © 2012 by Charlotte
Jones.

Photographs courtesy of Farrar Straus
Giroux Books for Young Readers.

Letter and all other photographs included
with the permission of Crosswicks,
Ltd., in cooperation with McIntosh &
Otis, Inc. All rights reserved.
R . R . Donnelley & Sons Company,

Harrisonburg , Virginia. For information,
address

Square Fish, 175 Fifth Avenue, New
York, NY 10010.

An Imprint of Macmillan
Square Fish and the Square Fish logo are

trademarks of Macmillan and
are used by Farrar Straus Giroux under

license from Macmillan.
Originally published in the United States

by Farrar Straus Giroux
mackids.com



Square Fish logo designed by Filomena
Tuosto

Book designed by Jay Colvin



eISBN 9781466801646

First eBook Edition : December 2011



Library of Congress Cataloging-in-
Publication Data
L’Engle, Madeleine.

A wrinkle in time / Madeleine L’Engle.
—50th anniversary ed. p. cm.

Includes an introduction by Katherine
Paterson.

Newbery Medal, 1963.
Summary: Meg Murry and her friends
become involved with unearthly strangers
and a search for Meg’s father, who has
disappeared while engaged in secret work

for the government.
ISBN 978-1-250-00467-3
[1. Science fiction.] I. Title.

PZ7.L5385Wr2012

[Fic]—dc23
2011033515

First Square Fish Edition: May 2007
First Square Fish 50th Anniversary
Edition: January 2012